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This permutation doesn't matter at the most popular west-of-the-park DCPS programs - the so-called JKLM schools - because they're already over-enrolled and turning away in-bounds pre-school students. A good case could be made for expanding those programs, but the schools are already over-capacity, and it's hard to justify adding another pre-school class when it requires third-grade classes to dramatically increase in size, or be evicted to trailers. Plus, the IB kids at those schools aren't exactly the at-risk kids the DC universal pre-school program is meant to assist.

One thing I forgot to mention (hard to believe, I know) - some schools really can't expand their pre-school programs BECAUSE of the guarantee of enrollment fron K-5. If 20 slots are added in a preschool class, and they're not ALL taken up by in-bounds kids, those kids will contribute to the overcrowding at every subsequent grade. At already bursting-at-the seams schools, this is a significant concern. This could be addressed by decoupling preschool from elementary school, but that's cruel to the kids (spend 2 years at a preschool making friends, but you won't be able to go to elementary school with them), as well as a political hot potatoe (making the minority OOB kid leave a school after 2 years of preschool so a white IB kid can attend - yikes).

No easy answers.

by dcd on Jun 19, 2012 1:53 pm • link • report

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